Upstairs @ TMoms

20 Years of Street Art Culture

From the first tag to the latest wheat paste, upstairs at TMom’s has been home to a rich history of local & international street art. This is an ever changing gallery: an un-curated & spontaneous outpouring of creativity by local & traveling artists and the countless visitors who leave their unique mark here nightly.

Two Brothers & 5000 Umbrellas

The birth of the upstairs as a vibrant art space is in part tied to a 1999 exhibition by brothers Noah & Nathan Rice. That year the Brothers Rice brought their umbrella wheat pastes we’d been admiring around South Street to Mom’s. All 5000 of them.

This blossoming interview series is a collaboration between Philadelphia’s premiere street art blog, Streets Dept, and Philadelphia’s unofficial official street art museum, Tattooed Mom! Each month, Streets Dept Contributor Eric Dale sits down with one local street artist to ask them about their work. Through this interview series, we’ll uncover & discover the growing community of street artists getting up around Philly and on the walls of Tattooed Mom.

***

The first installment of the Philly Street Art Interviews was with Hope Hummingbird, a new voice in the Philly street art community who uses ceramics as her medium. Sparked by the 2016 election, she took to the streets to spread hope through hummingbird plaques, RESIST tiles, and ceramic portraits of important women throughout history.

The second installment of the Philly Street Art Interviews was with Philly’s “voice of non-seriousness,” Faithsfunnn! Best known for colorful narwhals & trippy neon cats, her fun-loving work is often in stark contrast with the serious and political street art that can be found on the streets of Philadelphia—but Faithsfunnn still makes a point to play by the rules.

The next installment of the Philly Street Art Interviews was with the legendary Philly sticker artist, Bob Will Reign. As one of the first sticker artists in Philadelphia, Bob’s work helped shape the face of street art in Philly, & his hand drawn, cutout character made room for hundreds of other sticker artists across our graffitied streets.

Continuing into the new year, the first installment of 2019 was with pop culture lover & recent South Street business co-owner, Taped Off TV. Most commonly known for her stencil art & spray paint designs, her work spans dozens of mediums including stickers, wheatpastes, skate decks, and of course, VHS tapes.

The penultimate installment of season one was with Low Level, whose plywood street art designs are heavily inspired by punk rock lyrics. Spray painted letters and reclaimed surfaces have become Low Level’s trademarks, and some of his morepermanentinstallations can also be spotted upstairs at Tattooed Mom.

The final installation of season one was with Void Skulls, whose dark, mysterious, looping designs stand out among Philly’s other hand drawn, often character based sticker art. Branching out into linocuts and wheatpastes, their complex and chaotic art is a reflection of the dark yet fascinating underbelly of Philadelphia street art.